Thousands of allegations of child abuse phoned into Child Protective Services were not investigated.Department of Economic Security Director Clarence Carter, whose department includes CPS, disclosed the fact Thursday morning…
As police knocked on his door with a search warrant, 20-year-old Christopher Cruz made a last-ditch attempt to get rid of a stash of weed at his Casa Grande home, according to the Pinal County Sheriff’s Office.PCSO says Cruz tried to flush his pot — four pounds of it…
Some residents of Moon Valley, a well-to-do North Phoenix neighborhood, are not giving up their fight against a Goodwill retail store that’s opening there, in their neighborhood.With the store’s grand opening scheduled for tomorrow, some residents are actually planning to picket outside the store.UPDATE November 22: Click here for photos…
What was billed as the nation’s largest solar-powered carport system is finally online at the Phoenix VA Health Care Center in Phoenix after a year-and-a-half delay. As New Times learned in August, news articles and press releases in 2011 announcing the $20 million project’s near-completion had been premature. The panel-covered…
For Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s 75th workplace raid, deputies knocked over the Mesa headquarters of a company that repairs damaged homes.The result: Three arrests…
Longtime reader, first-time writer about this noble Aztlán. I watched the brown pride marches of the early 1970s and heard the shouts of La Raza and how it was going to be different now that the “Chicano” had arrived. The Mexicans were going to change things for the greater good…
Just before dusk, 18 strangers entered a yurt on a Midwestern homestead. Peruvian tapestries decorated the walls of the large, round structure, and rattles stood poised for ceremony. The participants — professional men and women ages 35 to 65 — put on comfortable clothing and set up sleeping bags, pillows,…
SPECIAL REPORT: FLORENCE EXPOSED | Part two of three Dustin Kemp is upstairs making his bed on a Sunday afternoon, when someone carrying a .45-caliber handgun walks into the room. Maybe he sees the person. Maybe his back is turned. Dustin is a cute 9-year-old with short, wavy, brown hair…
Only two other states in the nation have a higher rate of children without health insurance than Arizona.Georgetown University’s Health Policy Institute purposely did the study before coverage expansions are rolled out under Obamacare, finding that more than 200,000, or 13.2 percent, of Arizona kids are uninsured…
A Glendale man who apparently threatened people with an assault rifle at a party last month was shot and killed by an armed partygoer.We checked back in on the case after discovering that gun enthusiasts have hailed the shooter, whom police have identified as 39-year-old James Rakes, as a hero…
What if the MCSO had a community meeting and nobody came? That’s what happened recently when the MCSO held what it called a “community after-action meeting” in a lame attempt to comply with Judge G. Murray Snow’s orders in the ACLU civil rights case Melendres v. Arpaio. Videographer Dennis Gilman…
The American Civil Liberties Union is standing up for the Scottsdale-based gossip website TheDirty.com, and its founder Nik Richie.The ACLU and other legal organizations are going to bat for Richie after he lost a defamation lawsuit over comments someone else made, which were posted on TheDirty.com. An ACLU staff attorney…
The City of Phoenix earned a perfect score in the Human Rights Campaign’s measure of how inclusive city governments are of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people.Phoenix is one of just 25 cities nationwide that earned a perfect score, of a few hundred surveyed, and one of just eight cities…
One of two men who pulled off a “beer run” at a Phoenix AM/PM convenience store repeatedly smacked the store clerk with a case of beer when he tried to intervene.Phoenix Police Sergeant Darren Burch, the Silent Witness Coordinator, announced today that there’s a reward of up to $1,000 for…
The state incentives for Apple to open a manufacturing facility in Mesa could total more than $10 million.An Arizona Commerce Authority spokeswoman says there’s an agreement for a $10 million grant to Apple from the “Arizona Competes Fund,” plus possible grants and tax credits for the company that’s actually going…
As I’ve said before about Arizona’s ethically-challenged Attorney General Tom Horne, you can tell a man from Harvard, but you can’t tell him much. Which is no doubt why the Harvard-grad persists in some of the dumbest, self-destructive activity possible for a public official, barring that of Toronto Mayor Rob…
It seems there’s no time like the present to learn a thing or two about what’s going on in the Town of Florence.While New Times writers Monica Alonzo and Stephen Lemons are working on a three-part series, “Florence Exposed,” we heard from a filmmaker who’s directing a documentary on life…
Former MCSO Commander Bob Rampy, Sheriff Joe Arpaio’s onetime IT boss, was indicted by a grand jury on 14 felony charges, related to computer tampering.According to MCSO Lieutenant Brandon Jones, “The indictment alleged Rampy wrongfully released/accessed criminal history records, committed computer tampering on the Sheriff’s Office information system and committed…
Today in Found at the border: There’s a new all-time record for the largest unsuccessful pot-smuggling attempt in Arizona.The previous record was set in January, when a Mexican man attempted to drive 14,121 pounds of pot — with an estimated value of $7.1 million — through the port of entry…
Former state lawmaker Daniel Patterson claims in a federal lawsuit that his civil rights were violated when he was served with restraining orders and charged with domestic-violence crimes last year.Patterson, a Democrat, claims the Pima County Sheriff’s Office and the Tucson City Attorney ignored his legislative immunity, which he claims…
The Cochise County Record website and its crotchety publisher have been buzzing around southern Arizona officials for a couple of years now like flies on an old burro. One of those ticked-off officials, Cochise County Sheriff Mark Dannels, has managed to convince several Republican state lawmakers to take sides in…
Welcome to Courthouse Update, a weekly rundown of goings on at the Maricopa County Superior Court.This week, murder retrial for a former Phoenix cop is scheduled, three people guilty of child abuse and/or sex crimes get probation, and more:…
